


Portions of the Soul of Man

by aralias



Category: Blake's 7
Genre: Big Finish: Liberator Chronicles, Community: trope_bingo, Episode Tag, M/M, Season/Series 02, Truth Serum, Truth or Dare
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-01
Updated: 2013-02-01
Packaged: 2017-11-27 19:01:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,493
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/665376
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aralias/pseuds/aralias
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Blake has been pumped full of truth drugs and is now stuck in hospital with a leg wound while he waits for a plan to mature. Avon... is willing to take advantage of this situation.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Portions of the Soul of Man

**Author's Note:**

> This is an episode tag for the (very good) Big Finish Liberator Chronicle 'False Positive', but... I think I give you enough information that you don't need to have heard it. And the basic premise (the truth drugs thing) is introduced in the first minute or so of the audio, so I don't think that's a spoiler. I'm pretty sure, actually, (since i re-listened to it today) that the thing that makes Blake tell the truth is a machine, not drugs... so, please forgive me. Drugs worked a lot better though – and he's certainly taken a lot of those in the audio, so it's not entirely wrong. (Like the audio, the fic takes place in series 2).

The outline of Avon appeared at the end of Blake’s bed about ten minutes after he’d stopped expecting it. 

“You’re late.” 

“You were moved,” Avon said. 

“You’re still late.” 

“I teleported down into the room you were in yesterday almost an hour ago. I had to convince the old woman sleeping there today that I was the spirit of her dead son, so she wouldn’t raise the alarm.” 

“What a charming image,” Blake said. 

He was trying to be casual, but it was difficult with the alleviator drug still pumping into his veins through the drip by his bedside. They’d given it to him to stop him repressing unpleasant or disturbing elements of his history, or refusing to talk about things that had emotional associations for him – in other words, as he’d pointed out at the time, they’d given it to him to make him tell the truth. It could be resisted on certain levels, _if_ he concentrated. But Blake had stopped concentrating ten minutes ago and it was quite difficult to begin again at two in the morning with Avon smirking at him. 

“Have you got the teleport bracelet?” he asked to remind Avon that he was here as part of an escape attempt, not on a social call. 

“Of course,” Avon said, without handing it over. “How’s your leg?”

“Better,” Blake said. “Can I have the bracelet please?”

“No. How’s the therapy?”

“What do you mean ‘no’?”

“Oh dear. That bad?” 

_“Avon.”_

“’No’ means that I won’t give you the bracelet,” Avon said. “In this case, at least. It has wider applications.”

Blake tapped his fingers against his lips before he remembered that he was trying not to do that and stopped. It was a nervous tick he didn’t need. 

“If you’re not going to give me the bracelet, why are you here?”

Avon titled his head to one side, smiling. “Perhaps I should have been more specific,” he admitted. “I am going to give you the bracelet, but not until the end of the game.”

“What game?” Blake asked, but he already knew the answer and how much he didn’t like it. 

“What do you think?”

 _“Truth or dare?”_ Blake asked incredulously. 

“Why not?”

“You know very well why not.”

“The orderlies won’t check your floor again for another hour, and I’ve already looped the footage of you sleeping from last night. I won’t be caught.”

“That _isn’t_ what I meant.”

“No, I know. Do you want to ask first, or shall I?”

“Avon, I’m not playing. If you don’t give me the bracelet, one of the others will.” 

“Not if they think I’ve already given it to you. And really, why wouldn’t I have done?”

“You’re endangering the entire mission!”

“Yes,” Avon said. “It’s fortunate, really, that I’m not a revolutionary fanatic like you. If the mission fails, I’ll still be able to sleep at night. And it won’t be in a Federation prison, either. That, I’m afraid, will make one of us." He paused. "Six truths... or dares each, I think.”

 _“Three,”_ Blake said, trying to make the best of it. His leg wasn’t yet healed enough that he thought he could tackle Avon and wrestle the bracelet off him, and Avon was right: there seemed to be no other option. 

“Five,” Avon countered. 

_“Three,”_ Blake repeated, staring Avon down. He knew he had no bargaining chips at the moment and there was no reason Avon should do as he asked, except that Avon usually did. Eventually. “And I get to go first.”

Avon smiled. “All right then, three.” He’d given in very easily, which was worrying, but then the whole thing was worrying. “The rules are as you’d expect,” Avon continued, sitting down on the edge of the bed. “I choose whether I want a truth or dare from you, and, if I refuse to answer, say a truth, for whatever reason, you get to suggest a dare. And vice versa. Do you understand?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Good. I choose _dare.”_

Blake leaned forwards towards him. “All right, Avon. I _dare_ you to give me the teleport bracelet and end this game now.”

“No deal,” Avon said, seeming annoyed and, Blake thought, disappointed in him. 

“Very well. Truth, then.” Blake frowned. “Why are you doing this?”

“A sense of opportunity,” Avon said. “I knew you were down here and effectively helpless.”

“And I suppose you like me to be helpless, do you?” 

“Is that supposed to be an official question?”

“No,” Blake said. He didn’t want to play this game, but, since he was being forced to, he might as well get as much out of it as possible. “You don’t have to answer that.”

“I will anyway,” Avon said. “No, I don’t like you to be helpless. It is the state in which you are least interesting.”

Blake made a face. “Thanks.”

“You did ask,” Avon said pleasantly. “Now Blake – your turn. Truth or dare?”

It was difficult to be sure which would be worse.

Blake knew that in reality he did not have to do anything Avon dared him to do. He could simply agree – assuming the drugs let him agree without meaning to, and there was always the possibility that they wouldn’t – and then change his mind later once he was back on the Liberator. But his mind and heart rebelled against obviously breaking a promise to his crew and to Avon in particular, who was so prickly, who might well walk out if he knew he’d been lied to, who was... Avon. That mattered, and he knew he didn’t want to be in the position where he had to choose between his principals and his loyalty to Avon. 

On the other hand, Blake knew himself to be an intensely private person. He was free with his ideas but not with his life or with himself. The Federation had wiped out who he was, completely, and now he had it all back... well, he felt it was his and he didn’t want to share it with anyone, let alone Avon, who was... well, Avon. Under normal circumstances he would just lie about his personal life and feelings and feel no guilt whatsoever. But the drugs would make him talk, he knew that. 

Still, he had to choose thanks to this wretched game. Ultimately, the safety of the crew and Avon’s trust were more important than his pride.

“Truth,” he said and Avon smiled triumphantly. 

“What circumstances would compel you to relinquish command of the Liberator to me? For good.”

Blake grinned. “Waste of a question, I’m afraid.” 

“I don’t think so.”

“I’m not saying it’s not a valid goal, but it’ll happen or it won’t. There’s not much you can do about it. At some point I might be needed somewhere else, more than I am onboard Liberator. If that happened, and if,” the drugs compelled him to add, “I felt relatively safe there, I might leave. Then, if I though you were the right man for the job, I'd ask you to take command.” He considered the question further. “If I _died,_ I suppose I would have no choice in what happened to the ship, but you must have already come to that conclusion yourself. Or if the crew lost confidence in me completely– but, even in that case, I doubt very much they’d choose you over me.” That last comment was the drugs talking again, and Blake wondered briefly whether to apologise before Avon said,

“There’s no accounting for taste.” He paused. “Do you think I am the man for the job?”

Blake shrugged. “Possibly.” 

“That’s not exactly the resounding vote of confidence I might have hoped for.”

“What do you expect? Avon, you are asking me this question at metaphorical gunpoint. I’d have to be mad to willingly put the lives of people I care about into your hands, if this is the sort of thing you’ll do when they’re helpless.” He paused. “But there is more to you than you want to admit.” 

Avon rolled his eyes. “How magnanimous of you to say so.”

“I’m _on truth drugs,_ ” Blake said crossly, the earlier urge to apologise receding with every snide comment. “You asked me the question _knowing_ I was on the drugs. It’s not my fault if you don’t like what you hear, particularly when I was trying to give you a compliment.” He sighed and the drugs wrapped themselves around him more tightly. “I see so much good in you, Avon, for all you try to play the heartless criminal mastermind. I can’t help it. You don’t exactly practice what you preach. Instead, you prove you’re on my side practically every day. Today being the obvious exception.” 

“You’re right,” Avon said. “About the drugs, that is - the rest seems a little fanciful. I apologise. I was wrong to mock you for something you can't help. Shall we proceed?”

Blake nodded uncomfortably, somehow on the back foot again. “I assume you want another truth?”

“If you’re going to insist on repeating the same pedestrian dare.”

“Why do you stay with me?” 

Avon’s face contorted strangely, eventually settling in a scowl. 

“All right,” Blake said, “ _with us_ , if you’d prefer. Or even _on the Liberator._ It can’t just be because you think I might give it to you one day.”

Avon narrowed his eyes, clearly suspicious. Then he said, “I have yet to receive a better offer. Now, Blake – truth or dare?” 

“That’s all you’re going to say?”

“That,” Avon said, “is the truth. Your turn.”

Blake sighed and shifted against the headboard. “Truth,” he said reluctantly.

“Have you taken a vow of celibacy or is there some other reason you choose to abstain so thoroughly from even the idea of sexual intercourse? If so, what is it?”

Blake gaped at him. “Why do you want to know that?”

“Is that an official question?”

“No.”

“Then I choose not to answer it. The ball is still in your court, Blake.”

“I’m not celibate. And I don’t,” Blake said, trying to concentrate on the right things to stop himself saying the wrong ones, “I don’t abstain from the idea of sexual intercourse. What gave you that idea?”

“A string of facts and observations. Enough to be worth basing an idea on. I’ve known you for two years, and in that time you’ve never expressed a genuine interest in man, woman or child–”

“Those charges were _false,_ Avon, and you know it.”

“Actually I didn’t. Thank you. Well, that just leaves men or women in whom you seem uninterested, despite several of them expressing an interest in you. Jenna, for example.” 

“Well, I could say the same of you.”

“True, but I have reasons.”

“Which are?”

“Is that an official question?” 

“Yes.”

“I don’t want to tell you,” Avon said. “I accept that this means I will have to take your dare, and, once you have answered my question, I will therefore give you the teleport bracelet. But first-” 

_“Dare,”_ Blake said firmly.

 _“Hm.”_ Avon smiled. “I was hoping you’d do that.”

 _Bastard,_ Blake thought, but he was more irritated at himself. This should not have happened. He’d had so many ideas – so many ideals – about how this exchange shouldn’t go. Still, he’d done it now. He’d made the decision. Risk the dare in exchange for not saying... what? That it was complicated. That he did have feelings, emotional and sexual, but that without being sure they were returned– and without being sure how the rest of the crew would react, or whether he, Blake, could even handle being in a relationship– he wasn’t willing to risk it and that he resented that and how it made him feel like a coward, even as he knew the decision was rational and sensible.

Now he could only hope that Avon was going to choose something sensible. He almost laughed – something sensible. In a game of truth or dare Avon was blackmailing him into playing. Oh, yes, that was sure to happen. 

“I dare you,” Avon said slowly, “to kiss me.” 

“What?” Blake said.

“Think of it as a chance to prove you’re not celibate.”

“I’m _not_ celibate.”

“I don’t believe anything without proof, Blake. You know that.”

It was almost certainly a trap and Blake narrowed his eyes. “Why are you doing this?”

“I don’t have to answer that.”

“Yes, you do. This is part of my first question.”

“Then I refer you to my first answer.”

Blake thought back. “Opportunity?” he asked uncertainly. 

“Yes. Is that good enough for you?”

Strangely... it was. It meant it was about him. It meant – or suggested at least – that Avon might have asked for this any time, but had decided this was the best moment to get what he wanted. Blake leaned forward, putting his weight on the arm without the drip, and pressed his lips against Avon’s. It was a light kiss. That is, it was supposed to be a light kiss, but Avon opened his mouth almost immediately and Blake let him in, bringing his other hand up to cup Avon’s jaw as Avon’s tongue pressed up against his. Then Avon’s hands were both around Blake’s face so he could control the kiss, using that control to push him back against the headboard, and-

 _“Ow, ow,”_ Blake hissed, pushing Avon off his injured leg. Unfortunately, he hadn’t realised Avon was tangled in the drip tube and as Avon moved away the needle ripped from Blake’s arm causing him to suck his breath in through his teeth. Next to him, the drip machine started beeping loudly. 

Avon laughed, low in his throat, as he slid off the bed. “I should go before orderlies arrive to find out what the racket is.” 

Blake pressed his fingertips into the crook of his arm to try and stop the bleeding. “Yes. Good idea.” 

Avon took the other teleport bracelet out of his jacket, held it up and then pushed it under the pillows so it wouldn’t be seen. 

“Thank you,” Blake told him.

Avon raised his eyebrows. “For the bracelet...?”

“And for the bracelet,” Blake agreed, grinning despite the incredible pain in his leg and his arm. 

The corners of Avon’s mouth twitched upwards as he raised his own bracelet to his mouth. “Cally?” 

“Yes, Avon.”

“I’m ready to come up.” 

“Teleporting now,” Cally said, and Avon was suddenly outlined in light. 

“In case you’re wondering,” he said as a parting shot, “you’re the reason the other offers weren’t better.” And then he was gone. 

Blake smiled and leant back against the pillows. He brought his hand up to his lips, before he remembered he was trying not to do that. Of course, he would have to talk to Avon tomorrow about the practicalities of being in a relationship, and then it would probably get messy and upsetting. But for now – despite the pain – he felt happier than he could remember ever being. And that was the truth.


End file.
